How To Make Your House Smell Good

My house smells really good at the moment. I feel like I should try to sell it real quick, while the smell lasts, since I know that realtors bake chocolate chip cookies to help make houses more appealing and this kicks chocolate chip cookies' ass. I'd have bids from everybody who walked in the door, hell, I could sell luxury condos in the Robert Taylor Homes with this smell. In fact, as I consider it, it may very well be the finest smell in history. Prove me wrong, just try to.

Here's how I did it:

Chocolate Pot de Créme, Balthazar cookbook-- Take an enormous chunk of fine chocolate (I used Scharffen Berger instead of their suggested Valrhona), heat some cream with a lot of sugar in it, melt in the chocolate, whisk in some egg yolks, place in a bain-marie for a good hour and change, and voila, you have sheer, concentrated gooey fatty cholesteroly chocolatey wonderfulness. My wife, for whom it was made (since she often announces, plaintively, from the couch, "Where is my big bowl of chocolate?"), gobbled hers, then snatched the empty bowls from each child as he finished his and scraped out the last remaining bits. This is why I do not let her try crack.

Chicken Balsamico with Potatoes, The Italian Country Table, by Lynn Rosetto Kasper-- make a grayish-green goo out of pancetta, basil, a few spices, some balsamic vinegar, olive oil, garlic, and onion in a food processor. Stuff it under the skin of a butterflied chicken, scatter some potatoes around, and roast for an hour and a half, adding some wine and basting along the way.

Garlic, chocolate, roast chicken, balsamic... if I could bottle it, you'd buy it, trust me.

Sounds good, but a lot of work. I got similar results here be (1) boiling the heck out of a chicken carcass to make some soup, while (2) liberally applying Obsession to myself. Don't ask me why, but Mrs. JiLS found the combination fascinating. (And so did DogInLoganSquare; what can I say?)

I almost posted similarly, though I would have posted about how to make your house smell bad. Last night, I made Mexican (nothing fancy: barbacoa, guac, frijoles), and I fried up some tortillas to make chips. My two Valentines liked dinner, but tonight, 24 hours later, it still smelled liked fried corn in the house, and I noticed that my clothes from yesterday are deeply marked with the rank stench of a cheap taqueria.

There's something about the smell of burned corn that does not want to go away...

Hammond

hattyn said

I remember reading this house selling tip but for some reason associate it with apples and cinnamon or oranges and cloves.

When we went to sell our condo I did the following on days we knew we were showing - sprinkled cinnamon on a baking tray and placed it in a warm oven. You could also probably put an orange peel in there.

On our open house I baked and put the cookies on a plate with a sign to take one AND did the cinnamon in the oven thing.

David Hammond wrote:There's something about the smell of burned corn that does not want to go away...

I'm guessing microwave popcorn isn't a frequent occurrence in your office, David...

Bob S. wrote:

David Hammond wrote:There's something about the smell of burned corn that does not want to go away...

I'm guessing microwave popcorn isn't a frequent occurrence in your office, David...

BobS, funny you should mention that. My wife informs me that burning microwave popcorn is a frequent cause for fire alarms going off in the school where she teaches.

In the case of fried tortillas, I feel that the hot oil has something to do with the amazing ability of burned corn aroma to permeate a household. It's like aerosolized oil-droplets settle on all surfaces, and hold the scent for many days.

Hammond

Domenica mattina alla Napolitana

For me, the smell of nicely seasoned (herbs, garlic, lemon) chicken roasting is in and of itself intensely intoxicating. And when it is combined with the smell emanating from a pot of a Sunday ragu alla Napolitana, you have a combination that is not only intensely pleasureably in a purely olfactory way but for me also has wonderful associations of Sunday mornings at my parents' house, at my grandparents' house, and more broadly of the streets and alleys of Jersey City and Hoboken in the old days and also of Sessa and various other places in Italy.

This late Sunday morning smell reaches a crescendo when, just minutes before dinner is to start, some further fragrances are added to the mix: as the roasted chicken and potatoes rest outside the oven, the maccheroni cooks and gives off that delicate smell of wheat; then, the smell of cucumber arrives as the salad is prepared; then the smell of basil comes as it is chopped for its late addition to the ragu; and, last but not least, the whiff of red wine that wafts up from the just pulled cork gently caresses the nose...

At that instant, that moment before the pasta is drained, around one o'clock on Sundays, there comes together such a perfect combination of food related smells that I find myself now swooning at the thought of it.

Antonius

David Hammond wrote:In the case of fried tortillas, I feel that the hot oil has something to do with the amazing ability of burned corn aroma to permeate a household. It's like aerosolized oil-droplets settle on all surfaces, and hold the scent for many days.

Hammond

Hammond,

I too had this issue while frying tortillas, shrimp, and fish. The solution I found was purchasing a new fryer. I now have a basket style with a cover that has a charcoal filter. The odors are greatly reduced, and it was only 20 some bucks off the clearance rack at Target.

Flip

My home always smells great when I use the slow cooker.

If you want your house to smell like a taqueria, render some leaf lard. That took a week to go away.